_OceanofPDF.com_The_Girl_on_the_Train_-_Paula_Hawkins

It comes from shared experience, from knowing how it feels to be
broken.
Hollowness: that I understand. I’m starting to believe that there isn’t
anything you can do to fix it. That’s what I’ve taken from the therapy
sessions: the holes in your life are permanent. You have to grow around
them, like tree roots around concrete; you mould yourself through the
gaps. All these things I know, but I don’t say them out loud, not now.
“When will we go?” I ask him, but he doesn’t answer me, and I fall
asleep, and he’s gone when I wake up.
FRIDAY, MARCH 8, 2013
MORNING
Scott brings me coffee on the terrace.
“You slept last night,” he says, bending down to kiss my head. He’s
standing behind me, hands on my shoulders, warm and solid. I lean my
head back against his body, close my eyes and listen to the train
rumbling along the track until it stops just in front of the house. When
we first moved here, Scott used to wave at the passengers, which always
made me laugh. His grip tightens a little on my shoulders; he leans
forward and kisses my neck.
“You slept,” he says again. “You must be feeling better.”
“I am,” I say.
“Do you think it’s worked, then?” he asks. “The therapy?”
“Do I think I’m fixed, do you mean?”
“Not fixed,” he says, and I can hear the hurt in his voice. “I didn’t
mean . . .”
“I know.” I lift my hand to his and squeeze. “I was only joking. I think
it’s a process. It’s not simple, you know? I don’t know if there will be a
time when I can say that it’s worked. That I’m better.”
There’s a silence, and he grips just a little harder. “So you want to
keep going?” he asks, and I tell him I do.
There was a time when I thought he could be everything, he could be
enough. I thought that for years. I loved him completely. I still do. But I
don’t want this any longer. The only time I feel like me is on those
secret, febrile afternoons like yesterday, when I come alive in all that
heat and half-light. Who’s to say that once I run, I’ll find that isn’t